


Seed

by tree



Series: a large, ordinary music [1]
Category: Gilmore Girls
Genre: Episode: s04e14 The Incredible Sinking Lorelais, F/M, Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2017-07-16
Packaged: 2018-12-02 21:10:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11517546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tree/pseuds/tree
Summary: The aftermath of Meltdown in the Park.





	Seed

**Author's Note:**

> this is for [oykamu](http://oykamu.tumblr.com), who has been very patient. many thanks to wendelah for her comments and encouragement. concrit is always welcome.

> You hold love in your hand, a red seed  
>  you had forgotten you were holding.
> 
> Margaret Atwood, _Eurydice_

 

 

Luke's seen Lorelai cry before, but never like this. Never this heartbroken sobbing that makes him feel helpless and weak, makes him want to take the pain into his own body and suffer it for her. He wants to build a wall around her to keep out anything that might hurt, but all he can do is hold on and be a safe place for her to let go. 

After a little while she stops shaking and her breathing eases. He loosens his grip but keeps his arms around her as she lifts her head to rest on his shoulder. Underneath his hands is the nubby wool of her coat and through it the shape and heat of her body. Her warm breath puffs against his neck and it all feels intimate in a way that nothing else has for a long time. 

Someone walks by but Luke doesn't raise his head to see who. Come tomorrow there'll probably be more gossip, but right now he doesn't care. All that matters, all that's important, is here on this bench, in his arms. Together they make a cocoon of warmth against the cold sting of night.

They stay that way for a few minutes more, his cheek resting against her curls, just breathing, then Lorelai pulls away and starts rummaging in her tiny pink purse.

"I know I put a tissue in here," she mutters, face hidden behind her hair.

Luke waits while she wipes her eyes and blows her nose, giving her time to put herself back together. Finally she stuffs the tissue into her pocket and shakes her hair back, clearing her throat.

When she looks at him she doesn't quite meet his eyes. "So, rain check on dinner?"

"Don't worry about it," he tells her.

"Oh no, you're not getting out of it now. You've earned that dinner, my friend."

"Lorelai, it's okay. Really."

She presses her lips together and then nods. Her eyes are still red and swollen, her face puffy, and he doesn't think he's ever seen her look so miserable, not even the night she came to the diner as Mimi. "Thanks, Luke."

More than anything, he wishes he knew the words to make this better. But words have always been Lorelai's domain, not his. What he knows is what he can see and touch, what he can make, build, fix: with his hands, his sweat, brute force, and sheer will. He knows how to be there, to show up and keep showing up day after day. But words—the important ones, at least—seem to slip away from him like fish in a stream. Just flickers whenever he reaches for them. So he nods at her, slaps his hands against his thighs, and stands. "Give me your keys. I'm taking you home."

Lorelai looks up at him with a frown. "Did I suddenly lose the ability to drive without knowing?"

"I just want to make sure you don't end up in a ditch."

"Does Stars Hollow even _have_ any ditches? Would Taylor Doose stand for such a thing?" When he doesn't respond, she huffs. "I've been crying, Luke, not drinking."

He doesn't tell her how breakable she seems right now or that he knows no other way to take care of her; he only looks at her and sighs. "Lorelai, just give me the damn keys."

She rolls her eyes at him but digs her key-ring out of her ridiculously small purse. It's a minor admission from her, a small gift to him. Lorelai doesn't cede control easily, even when it's for her own good, and it's embarrassing how honored he feels by these gestures of trust.

They don't talk on the drive to her house. The few times he glances her way she's staring out the window like she's never seen the view before, or like she's not really seeing it at all. When he parks the Jeep and switches off the engine, the silence between them stretches. Lorelai makes no move to get out of the car, so Luke waits, his hands splayed against his legs. It's a clear night and the stars are bright pinpoints in the slice of sky he can see above the roof of the house. The ticks and pings of hot metal cooling fill the air with an odd sort of music. It's peaceful to just sit there, with nowhere he has to be and nothing he has to do.

"Want me to come in for a while?" he asks after a few minutes, when the chill starts to settle in.

Lorelai looks over and blinks as if she'd forgotten he was there, then shakes her head. "I think I'll just take a shower and go to bed."

"You sure?"

"Well familial humiliation is so hard on the complexion."

"Lorelai," he says, with his usual sense of exasperation. "I just mean maybe you shouldn't be alone right now. If you don't want me to stay you should call somebody. Rory or Sookie or—"

"Or any number of hotlines where real live psychics are waiting to take my call! Luke, really, I'm okay now. I don't want to bug Rory or Sookie. Jason offered to come over, but..." She trails off, seeming to realize what she's revealed.

"Jason?" he asks cautiously. The twist in his gut is a familiar one.

"Jason Stiles. He's my dad's business partner." She pauses and Luke knows what's coming next. "And, um, we've been seeing each other for a few months."

He'd had an idea there was somebody new, but she never mentioned a guy, and Luke never saw him, so it was easy to ignore. Now that the guy has a name, it makes him real. It makes him a presence in her life Luke has to navigate around. It shouldn't matter, he knows. He tells himself it doesn't, that Lorelai is free to date anyone she wants; she always has been.

"So you like him?" he asks after a moment, then wants to kick himself for such an asinine question. "I mean he's a good guy?"

"Well, he's not a bad guy. Although they have their own kind of charm." Lorelai glances over at him with a small smile. "He's a nice guy. A little neurotic, but nice."

"Good. That's good." Luke feels himself nodding like one of those bobble head dolls and forces himself to stop. "Okay, well..." He clears his throat. "I should get going."

She nods and they get out of the car. The doors closing make twin muted thumps in the still air. He waits for her to come around to the driver's side and hands her the keys. 

Lorelai smirks at him when he starts walking with her to the porch. "Afraid I'll fall into a ditch here, too?"

"In those shoes you wear, it's possible."

"Mean!" she gasps, glancing down at her spiked heels. "Don't listen to him, girls. He's just jealous that he doesn't get to wear pretty, pretty shoes like you."

"Oh, yeah," he drawls, following her up the steps. "It's my lifelong sorrow."

She flashes him a grin over her shoulder, looking so much like her usual self that for just an instant it erases the image of her wild-eyed and desperate less than an hour before. That woman was spread so thin she was ready to shatter; this one looks unbreakable. Luke knows it's untrue, but he wonders if sometimes even she forgets she's playing a part.

They both are.

He's a little behind her when she stops at the door. Over her shoulder he can see her gripping the keys but she makes no move to use them. He waits, unsure, for several heartbeats. Such stillness is eerie from a woman who seems always in motion. He touches her arm. "Lorelai?"

When she turns, all traces of humor have vanished. Her face is solemn in a way he's unused to. "Thanks," she says quietly, "for letting me freak out all over you. And for driving me home."

He stuffs his hands in his pockets, uncomfortable with the change in mood. This isn't the way they do things. "No big deal."

"You always say that and it's never true."

He shrugs. "I just, you know, wanted to help."

Her smile is soft as she looks up at him under the yellow porch light. "You did. You always do."

Luke has a sense of dislocation, like he's woken up to find it's afternoon when he expected it to be morning. He's gotten used to feeling that he's missing at least part of every conversation around Lorelai, but right now it's as if she's lead them into an entirely different conversation. One he has no idea how to catch up with.

Then she stuns him completely by moving forward and putting her arms around his waist. He's so surprised he's actually immobile for a few seconds, then his own arms seem to remember how to work and slowly enfold her. With his hands on her back he can feel the way her ribs expand and contract as she takes a deep breath and lets it out. She's not crying now, not upset, and this isn't an embrace for comfort. This is something else, something rare. Something dangerous.

Not for her, he's sure. But for him the closeness is overwhelming.

There's a fissure in his chest he'd thought had closed over in the last year. Now he feels it widen, widen. It pushes out from beneath his ribs, constricting his throat with a dull ache. Luke learned a long time ago how to wall away feelings he doesn't want to acknowledge, thoughts he doesn't want to think. He works hard and he keeps busy and at night he falls into sleep like a stone dropping into a well. Then he gets up the next morning and does it all again. But now, holding Lorelai, every feeling he'd thought overcome spills out like warm water cracking ice. The enormous wave of it steals his breath and all he can do is close his eyes and hold on.

Time extends around them in a small eternity, though it can't be more than a minute until she pulls away. She smiles gently but her eyes are still serious when she steps back. "You're a good man, Luke Danes," she tells him, before turning and letting herself into the house. 

He's left standing mutely on her front porch, shaken and alive with the sense memory of Lorelai pressed against him. Empty of her, his arms feel leaden and numb. He walks home in a daze, head buzzing with static, white noise. His heart beats too fast for his pace, like it's keeping time with a song he almost remembers. Blood rushes in his ears and the tips of his fingers tingle. He breathes out plumes of warm air but can't quite seem to draw enough back into his lungs. 

That sense of dislocation lingers within him; the night has turned strange. It's a subtle shift, nothing anyone else would notice. He feels untethered from the familiar, yet everything remains the same. The streets haven't altered beneath his feet; the stars haven't rearranged themselves in the sky. Luke walks towards the lights at the center of town, just a man coming out of the dark.

 

 


End file.
